2025 Fall Multidisciplinary Residency
Bethany Arts Community welcomes artists working across a variety of disciplines. Fall 2025 Resident Artist EventsJoin us in welcoming BAC’s 2025 Fall Multidisciplinary Artists-in-Residence!
This residency season, we welcome writers, filmmakers, choreographers, book makers, fiber artists, photographers, printmakers, painters, sculptors, interdisciplinary artists, community engagement artists, educators, storytellers, and more to Bethany for the development of new works and works-in-progress. We welcome 12 talented artists working across disciplines for our 8th annual Fall Multidisciplinary Residency.
As part of a residency at BAC, we ask each artist to build and facilitate a Community Program. Community Programs are a unique opportunity for both artists-in-residence and our local community to gather, engage, and be in conversation with one another through art. Community Programs are free engagements open to the public and/or in collaboration with a local community partner. We hope you’ll join these artists this residency season as they share their work!
Fall 2025 Multidisciplinary Residency Artists
Cohort 1
Valerie Bolling
Yan Jiang
Marjan Khorramgolkaran
Stacey Sproule
Sofía Campoamor
Chris López
Cohort 2
Alethea Pace
Robinson Moreno
Sari Nordman
G. Victoria Campbell
Bella Poynton
s.e. zelalem
Robinson Moreno (he/him)
Visual Artist & Animation Director
About Residency
Robinson Moreno (he/him)
Dates of Residency: 9/26 – 10/10
Residency Plan:
During my time at BAC Residency, I would like to work on the production of my first short film called Galaxia. Galaxia is an experimental animation film about the sexual awakening of Kevin, a young man, after meeting Galaxia, a streetworker, for the first time. The film’s current storyline reads: Kevin thought he knew what sex was until the day Galaxy, a sex worker, showed him her universe. From then on, reality and hallucination will mix in a dreamlike journey full of bodies, feelings and darkness, during which Kevin will discover the dangers of fulfilling his fantasies. The film is inspired by a conversation I had with the real-life Galaxia, after years of passing her by with my skateboard. With this project, I want to explore themes of how close can be lust and violence when we are unaware of our inner feelings and traumas.
Community Program
Printmaking Workshop with OUFSD
This printmaking workshop will explore Latin American art through different mediums of printmaking.
About Robinson
Robinson Moreno is a Venezuelan-Colombian artist based in Caracas. A graduate of UNEARTE with a degree in Plastic Arts, his work is inspired by his working-class background, focusing on social commentary, solidarity, and collective transformation. His unique style blends street art, printmaking, and animation. His work was recently exhibited at the TAGA Caracas Bienal de Miniaturas Gráficas (2025). He’s created urban art in New York and Europe and has collaborated on design and animation projects with the MECHA collective. Moreno is director of the animated short film Galaxia and has worked as an animator and colorist on productions like UN Safe (2022) and A Piece of Peace (2019). He was also a character designer for the animated documentary series Voices for Peace (2017). His work has received international recognition, including the Prince Claus Fund Seed Award (2021), Ragdale Youth Engagement (2024), the CNAC film fund (2024), and first-place awards in design competitions. He has also been an artist-in-residence at institutions like BAC ,TYPA, Surel’s Place, IDARTES, and Ragdale.
Artist’s Social Media
@robinsoncatarsis
Photo Credit: Ezequiel Carías
Alethea Pace (she/her)
Interdisciplinary Artist
About Residency
Alethea Pace (she/her)
Dates of Residency: 9/26 – 10/10
Residency Plan:
During the residency, I will develop a new interdisciplinary performance work that tells the story of a young Bronx girl whose flooded basement becomes a portal to a buried river and a deeper reckoning with history, memory, and ecological responsibility. Drawing from the Rights of Nature movement and rooted in an ecocentric worldview, the work interlaces dance, theater and song to interrogate systemic inequities in access to clean water, public space, and environmental health. This phase of development will focus on shaping the narrative, movement language, and world-building of the piece, incorporating insights and materials emerging from “Listening With: Harlem River”—a process I am leading that includes community conversations, youth workshops, and the creation of a Harlem River Bill of Rights.
Community Program
“Listening With” Workshop @ Ossining Waterfront
Sunday, September 28, 2025 1-2:30 PM
Join us for a gentle and reflective workshop exploring our relationship with the Hudson River through memory, movement, writing, and storytelling.
“Listening With” invites us to slow down and attune to the river—not just as a body of water, but as a living being with wisdom, agency, and its own story to tell. Grounded in the principles of the Rights of Nature movement, this session, open to all ages, invites us to consider the Hudson River not as a resource to be used, but as a relative, a witness, a neighbor, and a carrier of histories. Together, we’ll explore what it means to listen to the river—through our bodies, our memories, and our imaginations. Participants will engage in guided reflection, gentle movement, and embodied writing practices to co-create expressions of care and responsibility for the river.
About Alethea
Alethea Pace is a Bronx-based interdisciplinary choreographer and performer committed to creating work that is rooted in social justice. She is a 2025 Harlem River Artist in Residence, a 2024 MAP Fund Recipient, a 2023-2025 Civic Practice Partnership Artist in Residence at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and was a recipient of the 2021 Dance Magazine Harkness Promise Award. Her work has been presented by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, BAAD!, Works and Process at the Guggenheim, Pregones Theater, Dancing While Black, Danspace Project, New York Live Arts and the 92Y, to name a few. Alethea trained at Mind-Builders Creative Arts Center in the Bronx, and has a BA in Urban Design from NYU and an MFA in Digital and Interdisciplinary Arts from the City College of New York.
Artist’s Social Media
aletheapace.com / IG: @alethea_pace
Photo Credit: Whitney Browne
Sari Nordman (she/her)
Interdisciplinary Artist
About Residency
Sari Nordman (she/her)
Dates of Residency: 9/26 – 10/10
Residency Plan:
I will develop a new work, “Anxiety Hat”. The fiber-art work will be made of recycled plastic, and developed through communal engagement. Upon completion the project will be a colorful sculptural wearable, a hat.
Community Program
Anxiety @ ARToberFest 2025
ARToberFest, Saturday, ARTober 4, 2025 from 12-3 PM (Rain Date: ARTober 5)
Artist Sari Nordman invites you to participate in her Anxiety project that highlights tapestries made of recycled plastic, some of them made through social engagement. Anyone with simple knotting abilities can participate.
You can also wear one of the ready-made tapestries and have your portrait taken by Sari.
The project addresses the problems of single-use plastics and how they burden nature and people. Sari accepts plastic film (bags, packaging materials, dry food packaging) donations.
About Sari
Sari Nordman is an interdisciplinary artist. A native of Finland, she creates public art projects, fiber-art installations and video works. Many of her projects have been informed by climate change and respond to environmental social justice issues. Her work has been exhibited at Jamaica Center for Arts and Learning (Jamaica Flux,) South Street Seaport (Art at The Edge) and Thomas Cole National Historic Site (Upstate Art Weekend) in New York. Her work has been awarded ArtsWestchester Arts Alive, Foundation for Contemporary Arts Emergency Grant and New York State Council on the Arts Support for Artist. She has served on environmental artist panels discussing her works, and the environmentalism and social engagement in her process, at NYC Climate Week at South Street Seaport, COAL+ICE at the Kennedy Center and at the Hirshhorn Museum. She holds a M.F.A. from NYU/Tisch School of the Arts.
Artist’s Social Media:
sarinordman.com / IG – @sarinordman / Facebook – Sari Nordman
Photo Credit: Sari Nordman
s.e. zelalem (she/they)
Poet
About Residency
s.e. zelalem (she/they)
Dates of Residency: 9/26 – 10/10
Residency Plan:
I am working on a collection of poems based on a series of interviews with elders across shared marginalized identities. My work is primarily situated in domesticity, made complicated; I am interested in macro questions surrounding ancestral lineage and memory (both personal and communal), centered on micro scenes placed within the hearth. During my residency at BAC, I intend to conduct further interviews and archival research in order to expand and evolve this collection.
Community Program
Place-Based Poetry Workshop for Older Adults
Friday, October 3, 2025 10AM – 12PM
Join BAC Artist-in-Residence poet s.e zelalem in a place-based poetry writing workshop. We will read poets like Ross Gay and Dean Atta to ask, “What makes a place a home? How do the different places and communities you have encountered make up a unique composite life?”
There will be time for writing poetry, as well as sharing works written in class. For Older Adults, ages 55+. All experience levels welcome!
About s.e.
s.e. zelalem is an Ethiopian-American poet from Virginia, based out of Brooklyn. She has a background in performance and slam (CUPSI 2018-2019). A Watering Hole fellow, her publications available and upcoming include Brooklyn Poets (2023 Yawp Poem of the Year), the Black Fox Fall 2024 Prize, and the “Race, Culture and Space” anthology edited by Marlon Ross and K. Ian Grandison.
Photo Credit: s.e. zelalem
Bella Poynton (she/her)
Playwright, Dramaturg, Theatre Historian
About Residency
Bella Poynton (she/her)
Dates of Residency: 9/26 – 10/10
Residency Plan:
During my residency at Bethany Arts Community, I will focus on drafting my play, 3191, exploring the intersection of technology, humanity, and performance. My daily practice will include structured writing sessions and generating new pages, alongside reflective journaling on process and form. I plan to dedicate time each afternoon to reading and research, drawing from both theatrical texts and interdisciplinary sources. Community engagement will also be a central component of my time. I will host a reading of a selection from the play, followed by a conversation about the impact of AI on our everyday lives, ethics, and culture. The residency will provide both solitude for creative growth and opportunities to connect with other artists, ensuring my project moves forward in a rigorous, community-rooted way.
Community Program
“2191” Excerpt Reading & Conversation
Wednesday, October 8, 2025 7-8:30 PM
For Teens and up!
Join BAC Artist-In-Residence Playwright Bella Poynton for a reading of 2191, a new play examining how artificial intelligence shapes survival in a fractured, post-war world.
The story follows Fleur, a young woman who must rely on outdated AI systems to find her missing brother, even as she confronts the knowledge that this same technology contributed to environmental collapse.
This reading invites audiences to reflect on the quickly growing presence of AI in our everyday lives and the moral ambiguities it creates. Afterward, stay for a conversation with Bella about the rapid proliferation of AI and its moral and ethical consequences.
About Bella
Bella Poynton is a playwright, dramaturg, and theatre historian. Her plays have been published with Samuel French, Broadway Play Publishing, Applause, Smith & Kraus, and can be seen in The Best Ten-Minute Plays of 2024, The Best Ten-Minute Plays of 2019, The Best American Short Plays 2018-2019, The Weirdest Plays of 2020, WE-US: Monologues for Gender Minority Characters, and forthcoming in The Best Ten-Minute Plays of 2025. Poynton is the senior co-chair of the Playwriting Symposium at the Mid America Theatre Conference and manager of the Playwrights Wing at First Look Buffalo Theatre Company. Recent accolades include The Mighty Maisie at ART of WNY, The AI at Delphi at Bennington Theatre New Works Series, The Appliance Department at Hudson Valley Theatre Festival and the New Art City Festival, and GIRLAXY WARS! at Otherworld Theatre. This year, Poynton won both the 12th annual Inkslinger Playwriting contest and the 5th annual Black Swamp Players Playwriting contest. Poynton is an Assistant Professor of Theatre History, Criticism, and Playwriting at SUNY Oswego State University.
Artist’s Social Media
https://www.instagram.com/bella_poynton/
Photo Credit: Laura Rose
G. Victoria Campbell (she/her)
Songwriter, Composer-Lyricist, Poet
About Residency
G. Victoria Campbell (she/her)
Dates of Residency: 9/26 – 10/10
Residency Plan:
At BAC I will work on a two-act musical about Harlem Renaissance-born child prodigy Philippa Duke Schuyler. A biracial pianist, composer, author, and journalist, Philippa struggled with identity, constantly navigating otherness, in-between-ness, and self-love. The work will have a unique sound, blending Schuyler’s compositions with new, original music in a contemporary style, resulting in a vibrant cross-genre, cross-generational mashup score. A BAC residency would provide the time and space to focus on writing and composing, allowing Philippa’s story—rooted deeply in New York—to take form in its natural setting. This residency will move the project forward, hopefully toward a full production by the 100th anniversary of her birth in 2031. Though her life ended tragically in Vietnam, Philippa’s journey is one of brilliance, reinvention, and resilience.
Community Program
A Community Poetry Workshop on Identity, Legacy, and Belonging @ Ossining Public Library
Monday, October 6, 7 – 8:30PM
Join us for a powerful 90-minute experience honoring the life of Philippa Duke Schuyler—mixed race, Harlem Renaissance born child prodigy, pianist, and writer—whose brilliance was shadowed by a society that couldn’t see all of who she was.
Discover the story of a forgotten genius, reflect on your own, and help create a community poem rooted in identity and inclusion.
Together, we’ll:
- Explore an original song inspired by Philippa’s story
- Create “I Am” poems and poetic affirmations
- Share truths about identity and belonging
- Weave our voices into a collective community poem
This is a space for truth-telling and collective creative expression. All ages, backgrounds, and levels of experience are welcome. Come as you are. Leave with your voice on the page.
About G. Victoria Campbell
G. Victoria Campbell, Ph.D. (she/her) is a Seattle-based industrial-organizational psychologist turned artist-activist, playwright-composer-lyricist and poet. She’s best known for her original musical TREESON: AN ECO-MUSICAL (O’Neill Semi-finalist, ‘23; sold-out, off-Broadway concert ‘24). Her other musicals include PHILIPPA and OFF WITH YOUR HEAD. As a multiracial female who grew up feeling in-between and othered, she leverages her multicultural heritage, time living abroad as an expat in Switzerland, and her background in organizational change management to inform her art, which focuses on driving positive global change. Memberships: BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop, Dramatists Guild, MAESTRA, MUSE, Seattle Composers Alliance. She’s also a Soho House Foundation Fellow (‘23) and was an artist-in-residence at The Tyrone Guthrie Center in Ireland (‘24). She writes music in many genres including musical theater, folk, pop-rock, nu jazz, melodic metal and Nordic EDM and is a frequent collaborator with MoEoStAr, The Churning Mondays and Jacob Didas. Favorite spots where her music has been performed: 54Below (NYC), The Green Room 42 (NYC), the Union Theatre (London), Fremont Abbey (Seattle).
Artist’s Social Media:
Instagram – @gvictoriacampbell / www.treesonmusical.com
Stacey Sproule (she/her)
Artist, Animator
About Residency
Stacey Sproule (she/her)
Dates of Residency: 9/9 – 9/23
Residency Plan:
I will be prototyping a hand-made tarot deck with minimal imagery that sequences into an abstract animation, to be included in my upcoming exhibition Midheaven.
Community Program
Hand-Drawn Animation Workshop
Friday, September 19, 4:30 – 6:30PM
Open to Teens 15-18
Join BAC Artist-in-Residence Stacey Sproule for this youth-centered workshop on rotoscope animation. Learn about Stacey’s process, a brief history of experimental animation, and learn how to create short animated loops with nothing more than your drawings and a smart phone!
About Stacey
Stacey Sproule is a multi-disciplinary artist currently working in hand-drawn animation. She is interested in using and subverting animation techniques and processes to explore the liminal, the ephemeral, and the magical. Her work also focuses on advocating for the more-than-human world, and aims to boost the signal of those working to conserve and protect our world for future generations. Stacey holds a BFA from OCAD in Drawing and Painting. Her work has been supported by the OAC, she’s received a full fellowship from the Vermont Studio Center, and has exhibited at Forest City Gallery, FADO, the Art Gallery of Mississauga, and others. Her work has been featured in festivals including 7a*11d International Performance Art Festival, Les Sommets du cinéma d’animation, the Rhubarb Festival, Third Watch, and the West Virginia Mountaineer Film Festival.
Artist’s Social Media:
https://lunarialaboratories.com/ @staceysproule
Photo Credit: David Rendall
Valerie Bolling (she/her)
Author, Educator
About Residency
Valerie Bolling (she/her)
Dates of Residency: 9/9 – 9/23
Residency Plan:
During Valerie’s residency, she will work on a variety of writing projects. The project she’ll devote most of her time to is writing her third book for teachers – providing ideas and lessons for writing poetry, month-by-month, in elementary and middle school classrooms. In addition, Valerie plans to work on several picture book manuscripts, resurrecting and revising one or two in her “archives” and writing one or two new ones. Also, while at BAC, Valerie’s 12th book (7th picture book and 1st picture book biography), A Flea for Justice: Marian Wright Edelman Stands Up for Change, will be released on Sept. 16, 2025.
Community Program
Author Storytime at Ossining Public Library
Saturday September 13, 2025 11AM-12PM
Ossining Public Library, 53 Croton Ave, Ossining NY 10562
Join Bethany Arts Community Artist-in-Residence Valerie Bolling for a Storytime at Ossining Public Library. Valerie will be reading her new book, A Flea For Justice: Marian Wright Edelman Stands Up for Change. For all ages!
Link to event on Library website: https://ossininglibrary.org/children/programs/
Learn more about A Flea For Justice: Marian Wright Edelman Stands Up for Change: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/779677/a-flea-for-justice-by-valerie-bolling-author-temika-grooms-illustrator/
About Valerie
Valerie Bolling is an award-winning author/educator who is passionate about creating stories in which all children can see themselves and feel seen and heard, valued and validated. She is the author of seven picture books, including SCBWI Crystal Kite Award winner, LET’S DANCE!; Kirkus Prize Finalist, TOGETHER WE SWIM; and Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection, I SEE COLOR. She’s also written a Scholastic Acorn early reader series, RAINBOW DAYS and a book for teachers, GOAL SETTING IN THE WRITING CLASSROOM: BUILDING STUDENT AGENCY, INDEPENDENCE, AND SUCCESS.
A graduate of Tufts University and Teachers College, Columbia University, Valerie was an educator for 30 years and currently teaches picture book classes (independently and for the Highlights Foundation and Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance) and presents at conferences. Valerie enjoys teaching both students and adults and inspiring them to write their own stories. She lives in Connecticut with her husband where they enjoy traveling, hiking, reading, going to the theater, and dancing. linktr.ee/ValerieBolling
Artist’s Social Media:
Website: valeriebolling.com
Instagram: instagram.com/valeriebollingauthor
Bluesky: valeriebolling.bsky.social
Facebook: facebook.com/ValerieBollingAuthor
Twitter: twitter.com/valerie_bolling
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/valerie-bolling-223a92271
Photo Credit: Kimberley Eves
Chris López (he/him)
Lens-Based Artist
About Residency
Chris López (he/him)
Dates of Residency: 9/9 – 9/23
Residency Plan:
I will be working large scale collage pieces as an extension of my long-form historical project, The Fires: Hoboken’s History of Gentrification & Arson for Profit. The project utilizes, appropriated archives, portraiture, and oral history, to reclaim the lived experiences of a communities that have experienced intergenerational displacement, trauma, loss, and the erasure of their histories. The collage works created during my residency will concentrate on collected vernacular photography of familial archives.
Community Program
Partnered Program w/ OUFSD
About Chris
Christopher López (b.1984), a Puerto Rican Lens-Based Artist, Educator, and Public Historian was born in The Bronx and was raised between New York and New Jersey. He has been working as a visual artist since 2005. To date, many of his works have been based on historical figures and events on the island of Puerto Rico. Often exploring diminishing histories, his photographs aim to reconcile the past to confront the conditions and complexities surrounding identity and place existing within Puerto Rican people in our present day. Lopez’s most recent body of work, The Fires, explores the history of gentrification and arson in the city of Hoboken, New Jersey. The work utilizes the appropriation of archives, portraiture, and oral history to create a new living archive of this history born from shared community experience and knowledge.
Artist’s Social Media:
@bxclopez
Photo Credit: Kris Graves
Sofía Campoamor (she/her)
Singer, Songwriter, Producer
About Residency
Sofía Campoamor (she/her)
Dates of Residency: 9/9 – 9/23
Residency Plan:
During my residency, I will record and produce the final 4 tracks for my next album, “mirrorgarden.” The project takes up lingering questions from my sophomore album “with all the lights on,” which explored the body through the themes of chronic illness (physical+mental), mortality, and physical intimacy; the upcoming project reaches back to the “roots” of the heartbreak, anxiety, and avoidance present in the album, and celebrates the growth that is possible when this processing takes place. Working on the production for 4 songs over 12 full days means that I can “rotate my crops,” working on one song per day. I will be able to complete two rounds of revision on each production, with three days in between each session per song to let it breathe and become informed by my work on the other three pieces. This process will create a distinctive and cohesive sound world for this project, while allowing uninterrupted flow state to arise for each song by working on one song per day.
Community Program
Open Mic @ HV Books
Friday, September 12, 2025 7:30-9:30PM
Hudson Valley Books for Humanity, 67 Central Avenue, Ossining, NY 10562
Come on by to Hudson Valley Books for Humanity and share your latest poetry/spoken word/music projects with a supportive audience.
Bring your talent, your works in progress, and your positive energy to our stage. This event is open to teens and adults near and far.
At Sofía’s shows, she takes a collaborative approach, often inviting (but never requiring) you to sing along; this open mic will be conducted in a similar spirit. We’ll take time to get to know each other musically and personally, and encourage a participatory atmosphere throughout the evening’s sharing.
About Sofía
Sofía Campoamor is an indie folk artist, songwriter, producer, and community music facilitator. She first started writing songs to make school projects more fun; this lighthearted approach to academics took her to Yale University, where she performed a cappella music around the world as the first woman member of the Whiffenpoofs. After moving to Brooklyn, Campoamor found community with other a cappella enthusiasts diving into the world of vocal improvisation and circlesinging. She learned to blend her love of intricate vocal harmony with a passion for fostering playful queer community–live show hallmarks include call and response singalongs and songs written on the spot in collaboration with the audience. Her 2024 album “with all the lights on” weaves together the lyrical intimacy of folk with the sonic edges of indie pop and rock. The 12-song collection explores the body, delving into themes of mortality, chronic illness, queerness, and physical intimacy.
Artist’s Social Media:
https://www.sofiacampoamor.com/
Instagram – @sofia.campoamor
Facebook – Sofía Campoamor
Tiktok – @sofia.campoamor
Photo Credit: Lydia Lee
Yan Jiang (she/her)
Children's Picture Book Author & Illustrator
About Residency
Yan Jiang (she/her)
Dates of Residency: 9/9 – 9/23
Residency Plan:
For this residency, I will develop I’m Bored, a silent picture book exploring childhood boredom as a catalyst for imagination. The story follows a young girl, uninspired despite her comfortable surroundings, whose room transforms into a dreamlike world where the real and imagined blur. Surreal elements—plants sprouting from ceilings, objects morphing into creatures—reflect her evolving inner world and the joy found in uncertainty and risk. I plan to complete several fully realized gouache spreads and bind them with the dummy to form a complete, readable book. A prepared dummy outlines the narrative and style. I also hope to collaborate with a local school, library, or youth program, leading a zine-making workshop where children create visual stories about boredom. The workshop will culminate in an exhibition of participants’ work, reinforcing the idea that everyone is an artist and that their unique perspectives matter. This project celebrates imagination as self-discovery, inviting both young readers and myself to step beyond the familiar into creativity and growth.
Community Program
Turn Your Boredom Into A Zine!
DATES/TIMES/LOCATIONS
POP UP #1: Sat., September 13, 12:30-3 at Hudson Valley Books for Humanity (67 Central Ave, Ossining NY)
POP UP #2: Wednesday September 17, 3-6pm at Ossining Public Library in Ground Floor Cafeteria (53 Croton Ave, Ossining NY)
Sometimes boredom feels endless, and sometimes it sparks unexpected imagination. As a BAC Artist-in-Residence, Yan is exploring this in her wordless picture book I’m Bored. Come hang out with Yan, chat, and make your own boredom-inspired zine.
About Yan
Yan Jiang is a Chinese Canadian author–illustrator and artist currently studying at the Rhode Island School of Design. Her work centers on capturing fleeting, often overlooked imaginative moments—random thoughts and quiet observations that might otherwise pass unnoticed. She celebrates their quiet significance, bringing them to life through textured brushstrokes, mixed media, thoughtful lighting, and rich color. Yan draws inspiration from children’s books and literary works that evoke wonder and complex emotion, as well as from research into her own culture and everyday encounters that spark curiosity.
Artist’s Social Media:
www.jiangyan.myportfolio.com/ @garlicbunnyy/ @garlicbunnyy.bsky.social
Marjan Khorramgolkaran
Multidisciplinary Artist
About Residency
Marjan Khorramgolkaran
Dates of Residency: 9/9 – 9/23
Residency Plan:
For me, landscape is not just a place, but a lived, polyphonic, and evolving experience. For this reason, it has been my unit’s subject for years. My latest project, which began in January 2024 and is ongoing and which I plan to develop during your residency includes techniques such as 16mm film and cyanotype printing through hand drawing. As an artist exploring my identity and landscape in a new environment, I am creating a dialogue between personal experience and surroundings to achieve a multi-layered understanding of landscape using experimental media and recording observations and interviews. My focus has been on studying and recording landscapes in various ways: from analog photography and 16mm film to quick sketches of urban and interurban settings, and collages of images from nature and landscape books. The project also involves interviews with people who narrate the mapping of non-urban landscapes within historical developments. My goal during the residency is to deepen these efforts. I believe this opportunity will enrich my project, personal growth, and horizons through exchange, collaboration, and shared experience.
Community Program
Beyond Bechdel: Writing Strong Female Protagonists Workshop
Partnered Program w/ Pace University
In 1985, Allison Bechdel proposed a simple test for texts: did they have two women having a substantial conversation about something other than a man? Forty years later, we will focus on moving beyond the basics in our writing and crafting strong female protagonists who have a multitude of ideas to discuss with one another.
About Marjan
Marjan Khorramgolkaran is a multidisciplinary artist from Tehran. Her work engages Painting, Drawing, Printmaking, Textiles, Installation, and photography. She received a Master of Painting from the Art University of Tehran and is pursuing a second MFA at the University of Buffalo, New York. She translates nature into a distinctive language that can be envisioned through visual and tactile experiences. In this process, she examines the concept of land not through a lens of attachment, but from an anthropological perspective. Currently, after extensive travels in Iran and explorations in West Africa, she is dedicated to discovering her new environment while continuing her studies. Currently, after extensive travels in Iran and explorations in West Africa, she is dedicated to exploring her new environment while continuing her studies, while simultaneously focusing on making experimental films with a 16mm camera.
Artist’s Social Media:
@marjankaran
Thank you to our funders. Residencies and programs at Bethany Arts Community are made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Governor’s office and the New York State Legislature, the National Endowment for the Arts, ArtsWestchester and Westchester County Government, Westchester County Board of Legislators, Humanities NY, NEFA, The New York Community Trust Westchester, and numerous individual donors.
Bethany Arts Community is proud to have earned a Candid Gold Seal of Transparency 2026 on GuideStar.